Anton Birkenmayer

Artist Catalogue

Virtual Exhibition

Reductio Ad Absurdum (And A Carrot With Legs)

Thomas Nagel’s philosophical text, The View from Nowhere (1986), is about a single problem: how to combine the particular subjective perspective of a person in the world with an objective view of that same world, the person and their view included. This problem faces any being with the impulse and capacity to transcend its point of view and to conceive of the world as a whole. It is, to use Nagel’s words: “the most fundamental issue about morality, knowledge, freedom, the self, and the relation of mind to the physical world” because our response, or lack of response, to it will substantially determine our conception of the world and of ourselves, as well as our attitude towards our lives, actions, and relations with others (1986:3).

When considered together, the works on show motivate a distinction between qualities and experiences that vary with one’s perspective; and qualities and experiences that remain constant through changes of perspective. This body of work is a direct, material inquiry into the degree of objectivity that can be assigned to meaning if at all, using the framework outlined in Nagel’s text. By embracing the absurdity that often accompanies such philosophical inquiries, this project aims to evoke in the viewer a lucid connection to their frame of reference.

Perhaps that feeling we call meaning is a subjectively solipsistic experience, where the subjective experience is felt as the framework of all reference. Perhaps it is merely a clear connection to one’s conscious experience or something else entirely. Whatever the case may be, this body of work is my bid for the viewer's attention, and if I have succeeded in making objects that one might deem beautiful, then perhaps the problem of combining the subjective and objective view can be dissolved, if only for a moment.